LATEST HOMILY
2nd WEEK of LENT
March 16, 2025

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Focus: Die to self, rise to glory in Christ Jesus.

Function: Do not be afraid of death; embrace it in order to live.

I Remembered the First Time I Died

I remembered the first time I died.  I remembered the first time I breathed my last and I found myself to be no more. There are very few that have come back from the dead so let me be the one to tell you what it is like to die. As long as you are in this world, we die and we are dying every day.  Now I know you are probably thinking to yourselves: “What is this priest talking about today?” Of course, I am not speaking of physical death and if you thought I was, I find that hilarious, so jokes on you today! But when I speak of the first time I died, it was the first time I said YES to Jesus, to His priesthood.  To join the band of soldiers who are willing to die to self so others may live in Christ. The wellspring of Salvation opened up to me at the age of 22. To follow a vocation in Christ was the best decision I have ever made. But it was also the chapter of my life that I died to self.  I died to my past self.  I buried my old mindset.  Executed the thinking of the world. The day I died was a memorable one!  Somehow God still finds time for me to hold more funeral services for parts of me that I did not know needed to die.

Prostration and Resurrection of the Body

One of the most beautiful rites I have participated in the life of the church is the ordination of a priest. Before a man is ordained to the priesthood, he prostrates himself before the altar of God, flat on his stomach. It is a symbol, an outward gesture that this man has given his life totally, wholly, freely and willingly to the Lord.  No strings attached. In one word, my friends, it is death. He lays down his life only for it to be taken back up again by Christ and Christ alone! It is his spiritual death before the physical death. Oh, how challenging yet sweet it is to die in Christ. Challenging because the priest has to now die to all things of the world.  He must die every day and kill, brutally murder the desires of the flesh.  And no, it is not easy but oh the graces he receives the wonders that are untold. Even though he struggles in this world, he is stripped like how Christ’s flesh was stripped away from him at the scourging pillar. But with every counted breath he inhales anew, he inhales the life of Jesus.  That with every slow beat of the pulse, a new pulse starts to emerge.  And life as he thought he once knew it, is no more.  He finally starts to understand what it means to be in the person of Jesus Christ. When he rises from the Cathedral floor, he is no longer just a man, but one who has died with Christ on Calvary and risen with Him from the tomb!  A new man!  A new person!  A new soul in Christ! This is not only available for priests, my dear ones.  It is available for you as well. All of us are called to die to the corruption of the flesh and raise it up in Christ Jesus. That’s the beauty of the transfiguration. That is the glory that awaits us all. Though hidden in efficacious signs known as the Sacraments, the glory of God shines towards us and it longs to shine in us. But the only way it will shine in us is if we die.   So, prepare your funerals! Choose your casket and your burial plot! Have your final goodbyes and die to self!  Die to self.  Bury yourself.  Kill what is corrupted and lay a tombstone over the grave that says: “HERE LIES MY FORMER SELF THAYT WILL NEVER RISE AGAIN.” End the Life of pride, Ego, Gossip, Fornication, Pornography and Lust, Malice, Jealousy and Envy, Evil and Impure thoughts, Judgement of others, Grudges and Resentment, Ulterior Motives, For these are properties of Satan, kill them and bury them never to rise again!

Rise& Shine in Glory

Every one of us may know someone who has lost a body part or some organ and somehow life has changed for them. They may suffer greatly, But my goodness, for those who are strong in the Lord, how they bear witness to the glory of God.  That though they have lost parts of them, they have not lost their soul but gained more life than the person who has all limbs and is completely healthy. Like Christ, they bear their wounds not only to remember the journey but the victory in Christ Jesus they have won.   To remember they not only beat physical death but the spiritual death Satan tried to bring on them.  My brothers and sisters in the Lord, Jesus and His angels and all the saints desire for us to share in their glory.  They want us to experience the Divine and Immortal River of love and mercy! But we must die every day, my friends! Every day we must breathe our last to this temporal prison and elevate the body with Christ to the Heavenly Realm.  Notice two weeks ago, the sanctuary was adorned with flowers, now it is bear with three desert like plants, signifying to us the something has changed. It beckons to us to strip ourselves of the world so when blessed resurrection dawns on Holy Saturday, We can be clothed in white garments and drink from the streams of the divine fountain of Christ that transfigures us forever,  shining forth the glory of God in a new and resurrected body. AMEN!